What We Want Obama to Say About the NSA Spying Programs

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The biggest security story of 2013involved the leaks from Edward Snowden that exposed the National Security Agency's massive spying program. The leaks have kept coming, but today President Obama is scheduled to address some of the issues that have come to light.

At Security Watch, we've been following the story as it's developed. Here's what we'd like Obama to say.

More Focused Investigations The biggest objection to the NSA's spying program is that it sweeps up data from suspects and non-suspects alike. The government argues that doing so does not infringe on individual rights since no one in the agency should ever see "innocent" information. They point to XKEYSCORE, the search system devised by the NSA, which requires each search query to be accompanied by a reason for accessing the data.

But frankly, that's not good enough. Mass data collection is irresponsible for a number of reasons, and undermines the precept that everyone is innocent until proven guilty. Instead, it contends that everyone is innocent until a valid excuse and search term is devised.

"The NSA has two aims: to protect US intelligence against attacks from other nations, and to attack other nations to steal their intelligence. I wouldn't want to put obstacles in the way that actively interfere with those aims," said Neil Rubenking, senior analyst at PC Mag. "The problem is, the EASIEST path for them is to hoover up everything they can, including tons of data about private citizens, and then paw through it looking for bad guys."

"I don't have a problem with them tapping data from a known foreign agent's PC. I have a problem with them tapping data for everyone in order to get it," said Rubenking.

Additionally, Rashid argues that data collected by the government should have a set life-span. "The NSA should be deleting data after a certain period of time.Data gets stale, and there's no need for NSA to keep hoovering everything up and keep it forever and ever," she said. Six months to two years should be more than adequate.

Reveal The FISA Court From reading the New Yorker's excellent piece on the history of the NSA's spying program, it's clear that the FISA court and its secret decisions have played an enormous role in creating these controversial programs. This secret court makes interpretations of law which are not open for public debate. Their decisions are broad-reaching, and have dramatically changed how laws passed by Congress are used. That needs to stop.

"The secret court has to be transparent, with court records anyone can access," said Rashid. "No more gag orders and secret orders," she said.

Rubenking echoed this sentiment, saying, "the FISA orders that can legally force you to do something while legally banning you from talking about it, those are unconscionable."

Equal Treatment One of the unusual aspects of the NSA's program is that it allows almost unchecked spying of foreign nationals in the United States. "I refuse to make a distinction between US citizens and foreign nationals," said Rashid. "Up until a few years ago, I was a foreign national. A lot of my family and friends are foreign nationals. I don't think they should be denied the protections of the law that I enjoy now just because of a quirk in the visa lottery."

Instead of declaring open spying season on a particular group of individuals living and working in this country, the NSA should be required to obtain court orders—as they would for anyone else.

Ethical Espionage Monitoring communications and cracking codes is one thing, but the NSA has reportedly gone so far as to install back doors into computing devices. They've even been accused of weakening cryptographic standards. While this might make spying easier, it also creates distrust for American products and limits the ability of individuals to control and secure their own data. This has to stop.

A Middle Road While Obama was critical of mass surveillance as a senator, I think we can expect the President to propose a compromise between those who want to gut the NSA and those who want to maintain the status quo. It's a difficult balancing act, between the needs of running a modern intelligence operation and upholding the values that this country is meant to represent.

Max Eddy is a Software Analyst, taking a critical eye to Android apps and security services. He's also PCMag's foremost authority on weather stations and digital scrapbooking software. When not polishing his tinfoil hat or plumbing the depths of the Dark Web, he can be found working to discern the 100 Best Android Apps.
Prior to PCMag, Max wrote for the International Digital Times, The International Science Times, and The Mary Sue. He has also been known to write for Geek.com. You can follow him on...
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